Monday, December 29, 2008

Why am I always the first one at the instance? Why does it always seem to be the DPS who need summons?

Why do DPS players think that that sub-1500 DPS is acceptable?

Also, if you aren't over 2K, STFU about damage meters .

If I have to run back, you should be running back too. Ressing lazy people after a wipe is a waste of time. Parallel execution, not serial.

Please maintain Line-Of-Sight to the healer. Don't hide behind pillars. There's nothing more heart-stopping than seeing a player take a chunk of damage, going to heal them, and seeing an "Unable to cast" message.

You know, DPS players really infuriate me when I heal.

There's something about the duration of Beacon and Seals that bugs me. I have no problems keeping Sacred Shield up, but I struggle with Beacon and Seals. I think the time--1 to 2 minutes--is short enough that it has to be refreshed in-combat, but long enough that it falls outside my immediate horizon and thus I lose track of it.

I'm still mulling over gemming Intellect vs Crit. The math generally points to Intellect, but it really depends on hitting Divine Plea every cooldown. While Crit doesn't require extra effort on my part, and is not that far behind.

There was a real lack of blue plate gloves for both Ret and Holy. There isn't a single blue plate glove quest reward for Holy and only one for Ret. I wonder why gloves were overlooked. I'm very slowly working on my Frenzyheart rep to fix this.

Working on rep was a lot easier as Retribution.

Heh, I complain a lot about Holy, but I actually like healing. The level of control, of immediacy, of concentration is a lot of fun. I don't really feel like a separate member of the group, I feel like I am submerged in the group, or even that I am the group. Everywhere and nowhere.

What I don't like are DPS who are ... "inconsiderate", may be the best word. It can feel like they are actively working against the group, and that makes the experience extremely unpleasant. In contrast, competent considerate DPS are great to run with. In some ways the DPS have more of an effect on the healing experience than the tank does. I mean, the tank is going to take a beating, and take the majority of heals, and that is going to depend on her gear and skill. But that is expected. How the DPS acts is much more of a wild card, and really makes the difference between a pleasurable run and an unpleasant run.

Posted by
Rohan

46 comments:

I think we need a set of minor glyphs for each of the seals, that increases that specific seal to 5 minutes duration. Or hell, even 3 minutes might be enough. 2 minutes is better than the old 30 seconds, but it's one more thing that tends to need to be re-cast a lot.

I ran into the worst kind of inconsiderate dpser the other day. He put out sub-1500 dps and ninja'ed the Christmas Hat. OMG. Ninja the Bronze Drake! I don't care. Ninja the Frozen Orb! Here, I'll give you another orb. But, please, don't ninja the Christmas Hat.

PUG DPS is irritating, regardless of if I am tanking or healing these days. If I am tanking, there are those who just cannot focus-fire. If I am healing, there are those who just take craploads of damage because they just blindly whack on things.

The latest irritating adventure was with a below 1k DPS fury warrior (I wish I was kidding) who kept spamming his meters over and over again. Regardless of him being drop dead last!

My pet peeve is people who don't run back after a wipe. On my hunter when I see people do it I write "it is considerate of the healer to release after a wipe" it takes more time to rez then drink then buff then drink than if everyone just released.

I also can't stand people who won't bandage or eat while I'm drinking between pulls.

Come on a little help here.

However regardless, when I tank I hate people even more (not in wow but have tanked in other games). I hate tanking so much, because it seems like every other player out there is just trying to make things harder for me :) So I don't have any tanks in wow, just healers and dps.

I'm surprised you're getting mad at DPS these days. I'm wondering if your tanks aren't AOE tanking enough, in which case having an issue with focus firing is irrelevant.

I try to avoid PUGs like the plague, but sometimes they're necessary. I've been running into a LOT of crappy tanks (a lot of them DKs, but tanks of all 4 classes).

Heroics are so easy these days, if you can't AOE tank and DPS the entire instance, then you suck. I can't even remember the last time I sheeped something, I took it off my bar!

Oh, and I do usually run back. Unless the bad healer caused the wipe (for instance, I watch the tank's health go from 100% to %50 to %35 to %15 to dead over 8 seconds and never see a heal thrown). In that case, I wait for the rez.

I think the whole thing about DPS needing a summon is either very anecdotal or, well, indicative of the fact that 60% of the group is dps!

But that said, from my minor healing experience in WotLK, and thinking back to TBC/PreTBC, I must say that LOSing is definately the big killer here for me. I don't care if DPS is trigger happy, because I'm in the "just let them die then" camp, but LOS'ing and whining, argh.

My roomie is a healer. I'm a dps nut now. Sure, as a hunter I have quite a few tools to reposition and dump aggro, but unless the tank is stellar, you can bet your arse my priest buddy will get a few new grey hairs. So.. sorry, healers, it's not my fault, it's the meters! Start linking meters and my brain shuts off.

Well yeah, as Grim said, quite a few new grey hairs. But I spent some time being his healer when he still was a tank, so I'm sure I've done the same to him.

Anyway: yeah. LoS'ing. I HATE it. I've lost count of how many times I've wanted to leave a 5-man, or even a raid, because some nutter (and why are they almost always rogues, in my experience?) runs off into the horizon to hide when he needs a heal? Gah!

Fortunately I've engrained in everyone in my guild the need to all run back.

As for the LoS thing, speaking as a healer for the first 60 levels (back when the cap was 60 levels,) I've found that LoS is a healer problem 90% of the time. Especially if the LoS is on the tank. As for DPS, they could bandage themselves every once in a while. I remember when that used to be a more common occurance. I still pop out of cat form and heal myself when I think the healer could use a hand.

yeah they really need to increase the duration on beacon. Hell, I don't see why it needs a timer at all. It should be a permanent buff much like an aura. I understand they wanted to put a mana sink in for paladins, but why not just increase the cost of the heals slightly?

Totally agree on the seals dropping off part. I found it annoying even as ret while I was levling, same with Beacon and Sacred Shield (and to a lesser extent JotP) now at 80 as holy. My solution is an extra buff frame, using SatrinaBuffFrames, for the seal (and some other short buffs, like Light's Grace and JotP) and corner indicators in Grid for SS and Beacon.

http://www.acc.umu.se/~qwesto/wow/emikoseal.pngthe yellow corner is BoL and the white/grey one is SS

Usually available for 30-50 gold. Much easier than an 8 week rep-grind.

2.) Agreed on the beacon/seal duration 'issue'. I like the durations from a game-balance standpoint, but it's hard given my actual attention span. Get class-timers or use one of the other solutions suggested here.

The refusing to release and run back has always been a pet peeeve of mine. Not on pugs as much (I really don't pug much, if I can't get a guild group I quest/farm) but on GUILD runs. I had a druid healer who refused to release in ZA, and after wipe #4 on Malacrass, (one wipe caused by me getting a hair close and pulling as I was trying to rez the lazy ass) I got back to the group, started eating buff food and mana biscuits and did /afk. Came back 3 minutes later to see im STILL waiting for a rez, and the group gave him so much shit about it, it never happened again. To me, it's being inconsiderate more than anything and I see the *younger* set having a lot more trouble with it than adults who play the game. Great post!

Oh and I agree on plate gloves thing, and while I hate wearing non plate, if you can get your hands on the mail healing gloves from Noth the Plaguebringer, you won't be disapointed. Crit/haste and nice all around stats.

All you complaining about sub 1500 dps. Well I have to say I'm in a pretty good guild on my server. We cleared all but Malygos 10/25.

So I'm geared as a Death Knight for tanking and dps. However, I was tanking at this point in time. We decided to do heroic AN, the healer was weak, we had 2 warlocks one was at like 1700 dps throughout the instance. The other was at <600.

Less then 600 dps. How is that possible at level 80. I can't even fathom how you do under 600 dps.

It really makes tanks mad too when paladins just try to heal them with flash of light throughout the majority of an instance.

I know how you feel. I have leveling my Druid for healing first because it is much more convinient to throw a hot on some DPS and continue healing the tank. My Paladin was formerly Holy, but is going to Ret this expansion.

If a mage is pulling aggro these days, then your tank is terribad. Almost every Heroic and Naxx pull is AOE these days, and if Blizzard/Flamestrike/Arcane Explosion is pulling aggro, either the tank isn't using the correct abilities, or they're spec'd incorrectly or just plain bad.

Well, 600 dps at 80 isn't great, but you need to consider the context. Is it the full instance including trash? Affliction/Demo locks do alot of DOTs, if you are single pulling then I am guessing this about what I would get at 80 in that spec. If you are AOEing, then it should be higher, probably 1000.

My pet peeves? Don't show up to a heroic with <1000 dps. The group won't have enough slack to carry you through it.

If you have gone through the instance but nobody else has, explain the fights! A sentence is all it takes, or a few words on vent. The group as a whole needs to make sure everyone is on the same page.

I (healer) did HOL for the first time last week, mentioned i didn't know it to the tank. We proceeded to wipe on the first boss 3-4 times before the tank mentioned that it was exactly like the first boss in ramps. Meanwhile the dps took off for greener pastures and we had to rebuild the group (after that explanation we one-shotted everything else).

I realize I should have looked up the instance, but I dont think it would be too much to ask to say a few words over vent or type a sentence in chat.

I really liked every one of your points. After playing as a warlock since the game came out I switched to a shaman (healer) at the end of TBC. I was basically tired of waiting in LFG channel. Turns out that I love this more (same as you last point in the list) than dpsing. At that time I didn't have too many complaints since the majority of the people I was playing with were WAY better geared than the stuff we were doing (KZ, ZA, Heroics). But its has been very different in Wrath since every one was leveling and gearing.

The DPS should roll a healer (or at least a tank), so they can see that there is more to this game than banging their heads against the keyboard to hit 1 or 2 keys.

The other day blue posted the following, which I think captures the essence of many of the DPSers out there:

It's Never The DPS' Fault!

WHY U CAN'T HEALS ME THRU WRONG THADDIUS CHARGE? HUH? I HAS TO DPS!

It is never the fault of the DPS. If they couldn't beat the enrage timer, it's because the tank didn't generate threat quickly enough. It's because they had to run out of the fire because your spellpower was too low to heal them through it. It's because you wouldn't let them Whirlwind or Volley or Arcane Explosion because you had to Shackle the bad man.

Pick your analogy. The DPS player is the quarterback, the soprano, the lead singer. ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: AWESOME! BECUZ U R!

I think you're probably one of those evil DPS Rohan is talking about. Not everything is AOE, that line of thinking is part of the reason why there is a shortage of tanks/healers.

Some groups just don't aoe. Some groups with say 1 aoe class may not be able to do enough damage to kill everything before being overwhelmed.

I was in a group of pally tank and 3 rogues and priest healer for H UK, and initially everyone was in the mindset of no CC and "AOE", but after the first couple of pulls, Saps were used and we finished just as fast and just as smooth.

Also sometimes tanks that are starting, can't handle AOE, not because they have bad skills, it's just their equipment don't allow them to do it, and in this case that is NOT a bad tank, it's bad thinking scapegoating the poor tank.

That is why I always use, as a rogue, Trick of the Trades on the tank followed by a Fan of Knives on each multi-pull (and sometimes a Blade Flurry Killing Spree).

It is sad that misdirect abilities are invisible. When I pug hunters or rogues, I have no way to know if they Misdirect as soon as they can or if another rogues does the Trick of the Trades. As a side note, many humanoids and bosses (Skadi among others) can be Dismantled (and/or Disarmed), why doesn't it happen more often?

Now I had times when I tricked the tank and still pulled aggro later on said mob...

Woah you get a lot of comments... Everytime I want to say something someone else has already beaten me to it! =)

I second the comment about the Web Winder Gloves. Thats the ones I use and have had them for some time. I replaced the Patina chest within a day T_T and spent much more on it. I think I got the gloves relatively cheap.

Its refreshing to read another person fed up with careless DPS. I had a bad Heroic night last night and actually got a bit pissy with my guildies. They know its not always that easy on me being a pally healer, yet they want to make my job even harder?

My main gripe about healing is that careless players will spoil your enjoyment in a run. Warlocks Lifetapping between pulls instead of Drinking was a big one for me in BC, so much that I wouldnt even heal them. Not to mention Shadow Priests who don't use VE, but insist on using SW:Death every cooldown.

Being a healer can be fun and it is exciting, but more often than not its a thankless job =/

I think Chris summons up what is wrong with DPS these days better than I could have said it myself. Everything is AoE, nothing is CC, focus fire lolwut? And of course, if you pull aggro, it's because the tank is terribad. Not because you're ignoring the threat meter because you can iceblock anyway, picking your own individual kill order, going nuts before the tank has touched the adds etc.

The release of Wrath and the changes leading up to it shifted instance runs from a set of group responsibilities to where the majority of it falls on the healer's ability to keep up with the incoming damage, and the threat building the tank can do.

I run things in all three roles, although mostly healing and tanking, and have seen some really bad examples of each. But the one deciding factor that makes or breaks the experience for me is the quality of the damage dealers; some common sense, situational awareness, the ability to understand and act on the specifics of an encounter in a timely manner etc.

Focus fire remains important, even with AoE tanking as it is now. Makes life easier on the healer because the incoming damage on the tank tends to drop a lot quicker, or because there's less AoE damage from the mobs. Makes life easier on the tank because they're not chasing mobs, have less adds spawning etc. And threat won't be an issue.

Just requires that little bit of responsibility and awareness of your DPS role as part of a team.

As far as DK tanking goes, understand that our AoE threat abilities are on a cooldown, even talented, and/or depend on the spread of diseases. The latter requires a few seconds to build, as well as a mob in melee range. Unholy tanks have their desecrate ground effect, but even then the point is still valid.

It's also a new class, unique in the sense that all three talent trees are supposed to be viable as tanks. This means a multitude of different specializations and the possibilities and limitations that go with that; one might tank like a paladin, the other more like a warrior or a bear.

Give it some time; people are learning the specifics, specs and abilities are still changing. Gearing up for crit immunity is also a bit more of a challenge at the moment for most, although the next patch seems to fix a lot of that.

* Why am I always the first one at the instance? Why does it always seem to be the DPS who need summons?

- then stop summoning. I originally dutifully travelled to the meeting stone every run then I kinda got fed up. Now I regard being in a group as a sign I should be at least ready to accept a summons but no more than that. Sometimes I'll go summon if I'm close or if nothing solo draws me. I'll always try to support anyone who is politely asking for people to move but the guy at the Auction House asking summ???? can sit there all day before I move

* Why do DPS players think that that sub-1500 DPS is acceptable?

- because it is. I've completed many instances where 3 dps have all been around 1000 dps and we've got through with no wipes and no drama. I'm saying this as a healer, you don't need high dps to complete heroics.

* Also, if you aren't over 2K, STFU about damage meters .

If you get annoyed then start playing games with them. Let them die when they rip aggro. Bop melee dps (their damage goes to zero until they figure out what's happened and click the bop off). Salv the tank. DI the tank. When people complain state that you'll start playing properly if they do, ie not meter whoring and nuking the wrong target.

* If I have to run back, you should be running back too. Ressing lazy people after a wipe is a waste of time. Parallel execution, not serial.

- there's no great answer to this. Replacing them works but wastes 20 mins. Refusing to ress never works. They won't change and it just turns the group to crap for the other 3 players. If you have tank/dps who can ress then next time you wipe say "ress plz" before anyone else and watch tv or read while they run back to ress you.

* Please maintain Line-Of-Sight to the healer. Don't hide behind pillars. There's nothing more heart-stopping than seeing a player take a chunk of damage, going to heal them, and seeing an "Unable to cast" message.

- I actually don't agree with this. We have instants, we can move. On certain fights like HoL 3rd boss you can be cut off from injured dps by spiders but even there you can often keep them up (BoL tank, run back quick and DF HS the LOSer). But everyone has their playstyle and if it annoys you to heal los-ers just don't sweat it when they die. If they whine just tell them you were Los-ed

* You know, DPS players really infuriate me when I heal.

- Then go back to Ret. Sure, you instance less but questing and pvp are more fun and at least when you instance you are doing what you enjoy. I heal because I prefer healing (I actually retired a Mage to make Paladin healer my main)

* There's something about the duration of Beacon and Seals that bugs me.

- Familiarity completely solves this, possibly interface too. I use Healbot and I can always see if BoL and SS are up because they show up on the life bars. I notice Seals because I Judge a lot.

* I'm still mulling over gemming Intellect vs Crit.

- doesn't really matter. For a long answer check my post in the paladin forums of Plusheal but having two good options for yellow (3 if you count Haste) isn't a disadvantage. Just wish one of them were Blue ^^

* There was a real lack of blue plate gloves for both Ret and Holy.

- no need to grind rep, just wear non-plate. The pvp healer gloves are very good btw since they have +2% FoL crit

* Working on rep was a lot easier as Retribution.

- that's arguable. I have instance invites coming out of my ears now. If I randomly join lfg and put Healer in comments I get an inv within 2 minutes. Most of the juicy rep rewards are from the reps you progress in Heroics

* Heh, I complain a lot about Holy, but I actually like healing.

- yup, me too

What I don't like are DPS who are ... "inconsiderate", may be the best word.

- It goes with pugging and even with running guild groups. The Greedy Goblin has posted an excellent response to this post over on his site. Basically he explains it's just self-interest - the dpsers can get what they want from joining your group and have no motivation to behave themselves if messing around is more fun

Try an addon like Karma to collect good players you enjoy playing with. Form groups yourself and select the players. Interview them or Armory them to see if they are idiots (asking them if about their raid experiences gives you a great insight into randoms). Choose players by doing /who [good raid guild] then /w members of that guild

I love healing and I love pugging. Hope your experiences become more enjoyable soon!

I cannot agree with you more. More often than not, it's the DPS that make and break what would have been a good run. Only in rare cases does an incompetent tank bring the whole group down. I suppose it's because a good healer can keep the tank going as long as DPS is decent (I'm talking >1700 at least). As a former Mage switching to a Holy paladin, the shift from dps to healing is a whole new paradigm. I guess DPS just don't see things the same as we do.

You should never feel any personal feelings when people die. Especially when they die because of their own actions.

Part of being a good player no matter your role is being aware of your surroundings. Putting out sub 2k dps shows you arent a good player.

Even if you do pug alot....you will find out who is and or isnt a good player. From this you can always make groups to do things. Especially if you are a healer or tank, and pretty dang solid...you can have a group that wants you all the time

A dps who has never been a healer or tank will always be a risk. And that follows for all the roles - you need to have actually done all three modes to appreciate the needs of each (tank, dps, heal).

It also follows for classes, but to a much lesser extent. Show me a great healer and I bet they have been a tank and a dps at some stage - because its about the player. Good ones try their hand at everything, bad ones will just use the default rotation on EJ Forums.

"If I have to run back, you should be running back too. Ressing lazy people after a wipe is a waste of time. Parallel execution, not serial."

I had a party fall apart on me on this exact issue. The farcical thing about it was that this occured on the first trash mobs of the Nexus, where the res point is some 10 seconds from the entrance (tank? What tank?).

A dps refused to corpse run, and I refused to res them, seeing as we were so close to the entrance.

The dps quit the party rather than press the res button (and so had to corpse run after all - logic?).

I then got a load of abuse from another player in the group; it was all my fault they left, and why was I such a ****?

Why do people refuse to run back after a wipe? In a 25 man run if I were the only healer to run back, mana up, rez the healers, mana up, rez a few more, and then mana up again...? What if I didn't have mage food which has happened to me several times?

Then there are those that after a rez who don't have food to heal back up or at least refuse to eat. I then have to heal them. What makes them so special that they don't have to use their food, but I have to use mine? Sure it's a few measly silver, but is it fair?

"Please maintain Line-Of-Sight to the healer. Don't hide behind pillars. There's nothing more heart-stopping than seeing a player take a chunk of damage, going to heal them, and seeing an "Unable to cast" message."

When I see a healer saying stuff like that I die a little in side. Its YOUR job to be on los of your group. Yes I admit that once in a while it is impossible to follow someone around and keep them up, but 99.999% of the time in PVE its YOUR job to stay in los of them and keep them topped. FOL Glyph really comes in handy here-- oh wait you don't use FOL.

Though you might be right about the FoL glyph. My old issue with the FoL glyph was that I used to spam FoL a lot, and that style is a poor fit for the glyph. Now with HL being used a lot more for tank healing, using glyphed-FoL for healing the rest of the group might be interesting.

It might depend on how glyphed-FoL interacts with Beacon of Light, I think. The last time I checked in Beta, the HoT portion didn't get copied by Beacon.

Regardless, it's a moot point with 3.0.8.

As for LoS, I think that the healer should maintain LoS on the tank and be somewhat central to make it easy for the DPS. But I don't think it's the healer's responsibility to chase down DPS that run off to odd positions.

First, I am one of those DPSers (a rogue) who is somewhere between completely awful (<2K) or perfectly acceptable (>1K). I haven't done any raids yet, but for for normal or heroic runs, my 1300-1500 seems to be enough.

Running back. I will usually wait until the healer dies before releasing. I have been yelled at for releasing too soon (when someone could self rez) and then making the group wait while I do a long run. I (stupidly) died on the first boss in HoL and was able to run back and get back in the fight since the graveyard is so close.

Note to healers: if I die, I am going to eat one of the buf foods anyway so you really don't need to heal me (unless it was a battle rez of course). I mean, thanks and all, but save your mana.